Turkey Gravy Secrets Revealed
To make the best tasting turkey gravy you need three things;
well-seasoned fat, flour, and a good rich broth. For each cup of
finished gravy you will need one tablespoon of fat, one
tablespoon of flour and 1 cup of broth.
Start by making up some rich turkey broth. You can use the
turkey neck, heart, gizzard or other parts usually found packed
inside the turkey cavity. Add some minced onion, diced celery
and 1/2 teaspoon salt in enough water to cover, simmer until
vegetables are tender. Dice the turkey liver, add to the broth
and simmer for about 15 minutes.
You can use the turkey bones if you like. The turkey bones yield
much more broth, just add more onions and celery to the pan. You
will have to carve the turkey ahead of time, which means no
whole roasted turkey sitting on the dinner table waiting to be
carved by the host or hostess. Make sure you use the drippings
from the roasting pan, as grandpa always said "that's the
goodies", just after you've removed the cooked turkey and
roasting rack from the roasting pan. Strain poultry drippings
through a sieve into a 4-cup glass measuring cup.
Add 3 tablespoons of corn oil to the bottom of the roasting pan.
Stir around to get out the brown bits that have baked on. Add to
your turkey drippings. "Wash" the roasting pan out with the
turkey broth if it's made or add water your going to use in the
broth if you haven't made it yet. The trick is to know how many
cups of broth you have and if you have enough fat. Remember you
will need one tablespoon of fat, one tablespoon of flour and 1
cup of broth for each cup of finished gravy.
If you are light on broth you can add some canned chicken broth.
If you are light on fat you can add a small amount of corn oil.
You can save the rest of your broth for storing and reheating
the turkey.
Here are a few more tips to making great tasting gravy:
First take the measured fat and combine with the proper amount
of measured flour in a medium saucepan. Make sure you have
covered all the flour with fat and blended it well. Place on
burner. Slowly bring the flour and fat mixture to a simmer until
it begins to smell slightly salty. It will be bubbly; the color
will be a light brown.
Next remove pan from burner; whisk in all the measured liquids.
Finally return the pan to the burner, again, slowly bring this
to a simmer.
Remember you already cooked the flour in the fat so all you need
to do now is stir this until it thickens up to your liking. You
can let it stay sort of thin or let it cook out until it is
thicker than your Mashed potatoes. The choice is yours.
About the author:
Frank Flohr (aka Chef Phronc) is passionate about cooking and is
a self proclaimed "Chef". Frank serves up a full plater of
cooking tips, free recipes, resources and culimary information
at
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